<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>And If I Lay To Rest by Mei_Kalkaros</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25804258">And If I Lay To Rest</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mei_Kalkaros/pseuds/Mei_Kalkaros'>Mei_Kalkaros</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic (Video Game)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Ogasawara Legacy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-09</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 10:47:56</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,993</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25804258</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mei_Kalkaros/pseuds/Mei_Kalkaros</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Private Keiko'li Ogasawara, a young Junior Astrographer for the Imperial Navy, is teamed with a Reclamation team to investigate a new Sith world called SR-819 when things go terribly wrong. Written in the journal style of Keiko'li.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>And If I Lay To Rest</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>
    
  </p>
</div><hr/>
<p><span class="u">Day 5</span><br/>
<em>I guess 5 days in, I should probably write about this. My first real mission—aiding a Reclamations team to an ancient Sith world we are calling SR-819 (that’s what the higher up have instructed us to call it). My priority assignment on this is to use my skills as a Junior Astrographer, secondary would be technical assistance, as required. This is really my first “in the field” assignment, so I’m both nervous and excited.<br/>
<br/>
The team and I have finished our orbital observation of SR-819. It does not appear to be the most hospitable rock in the galaxy having observed very little in the way of water and greens. It reminds me more of what Aunt Mei tells me about Korriban, or what I’ve read about Ziost and Nathema. I’m not too concerned, I’ve lived on Tatooine for quite some time now and have adapted to that easily. The poles of the planet seem to show signs of ice, so maybe there is life down there somewhere. I truly hope there are no Sith spawns or anything like that, but knife-flipping Boomer assures me that I shouldn’t worry as long as he is around.<br/>
<br/>
I like my team. Boomer reminds me a bit of my dad—cocky, arrogant at times, but good at his job. I get along well with him, but he doesn’t quite have the humor that dad brings with him to these types of things, but that’s ok. I’d prefer to have someone who isn’t about to joke about a bad situation. Cloke is pretty levelheaded (and a bit of a hardass). She’s all business—a trained and dedicated soldier. She’s probably why Boomer doesn’t joke around. Then there’s Morrison, the leader of our team. He’s confident, calm and precise in what he needs us to do. He’s older than the rest of us (like white hair older, but I can tell he knows more than any of us, and I hope to learn from him). I’m actually the youngest, the rookie you might say, though I’m no stranger to charting unknown areas of the galaxy (thanks dad!)</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 6</span><br/>
<em>It feels strange here—almost exactly what I was expecting SR-819 to be. It’s dusty, it appears to be lifeless, but the weather is cool and tolerable. We’ve set up camp on a cliffside, about 5 klicks from our shuttle, to have the “higher ground” if anything attempts to come at us. I doubt anything will, this place is quiet—almost too quiet. Boomer says “it’s the calm before the storm,” and of course that sets Cloke off and she tells him to stop that negative talk while Morrison and I are the only ones actually settling in and setting up our equipment. I like to think that Boomer and Cloke were rivals at the Academy. When things get too ‘heated’ between them, that’s when Morrison steps up and gives them orders. I doubt I’ll ever have that kind of command over people.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 7</span><br/>
<em>Boomer was right: the calm before the storm. We woke this morning with an odd strobing light (it made popping sounds too). And then I find that my cybernetics have been fried (which explains the headache I have). All my work is gone too—my charts and maps and technical notes on this place. I never recorded any strange electric anomalies since we touched down.<br/>
<br/>
Cloke and Boomer were sent to check on our shuttle. It’s fried too. We have no way off unless someone comes looking for us.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 8</span><br/>
<em>Boomer and Cloke are acting strange. They both are showing signs of confusion, like they don’t know why we are here. Cloke even made reference to her parents, as if they were here, and I’m told they were killed when she was twelve years old. So far, myself and Morrison are still the same.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 9</span><br/>
<em>I heard the popping sound again, and could see the flashes through my tent last night. Morrison was on patrol, but says he didn’t get a good look at “it”. He instructed me to keep recording what I can of this place (I’ve had to restart—some of it from memory—all the mapping and notes I had done previously before they were wiped out). He tells Boomer to check on the comms, and Boomer just sat there like he didn’t care. Even Cloke seemed to not give a womprat’s ass about what’s going on.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 10</span><br/>
<em>I woke up this morning hearing Cloke scream like she were being murdered. It was still a bit dark and I saw in the distance the flashing light. Cloke didn’t show any signs of physical harm, but she kept screaming and screaming. Morrison had to sedate her. Boomer just sat there and stared blankly at her.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 13</span><br/>
<em>They’re gone, Boomer and Cloke. Like disappeared gone. No sign of them. Morrison and I moved our camp. He said it wasn’t safe there—how is it safe where we are now? Maybe he knows something I don’t. Maybe he has a clue to where they’ve gone. I took what little I could carry of their personal effects: Boomer’s knife (it’s engraved ‘with love from mom’), and Cloke’s imagecaster (which has an old photo of her parents, and it looks like she had a sister).<br/>
<br/>
We still hear the that electric popping sound. I keep my eyes shut. I don’t know if it helps, but I haven’t been the one to see the light directly.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 15</span><br/>
<em>Now Morrison is gone. I woke this morning to find myself alone in our camp. Again, his disappearance is as strange as Boomer and Cloke’s. His belongings are here. His blissl, the little windpipe he carried around his neck for safe keeping, and even his half drunk cup of caf, which is still warm. He couldn’t have gotten far, but as I searched the campsite, I found no evidence of his footprints to clue me into which direction he (and maybe even the others) might have gone. I find no signs of a struggle or attack.<br/>
<br/>
Yesterday he exhibited the same symptoms as the others: confusion, displacement, indifference, and then the terror. The terror that came out of nowhere. I think he was reliving an experience from a battle—he kept yelling that he needed a medic. What caused it? Was it that flashing light? I believe we had been careful after it took the others, but maybe it came when he was keeping watch; he deemed me too inexperienced to keep watch—and now I’m all alone.<br/>
<br/>
I guess this means I’m next.<br/>
<br/>
I debated leaving our camp, but now it seems the only logical thing to do. If this thing is tracking us, somehow, then moving is the only option I see that I have. The only way to make myself believe I still have some kind of control over all this. They don’t train you for this at the academy—not me anyway. I’m just an analysist. An astrographer—and a junior one at that. I finished in the top 5% of my class, but I wasn’t trained to be the only one left of my team on a strange planet.<br/>
<br/>
They teach you never to abandon your people. Leave no one behind, but what do you do when you can’t find them? I have nothing but their trinkets to bring home with me. Morrison’s blissl, Boomer’s knife, and Cloke’s imagecaster.<br/>
<br/>
I can’t take everything. I’m only one person so I have to be conscientious of what I decide to take with me: my small comm unit, canteen, compass, all the rations I can carry in my rucksack, medkit, batteries, and my blaster are the most important. I hope it’ll be enough.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 16</span><br/>
<em>I didn’t sleep last night after I left camp. I heard it though. I think it was searching for me. That electric pop pop pop sends chills up my spine. Pop pop pop. Then silence. Then pop pop pop. It seems to move quickly from one place to the next. I’ve never heard of such a thing in my life. What is it and where did it come from? The compass I brought seems to go haywire anytime this thing appears.<br/>
<br/>
I’m vaguely reminded of my time alone after the Eternal Fleet invaded our home. Dad missing, presumed dead, and me all alone. Here I am again, though this time it’s not pirates or gangs after me. It’s this thing. This light. And unfortunately I’m down a ship too. Not that I’d be one to high tail and run away from my team. I want to find them. I can’t leave them behind but I have no idea where they could have even gone.<br/>
<br/>
I don’t know if Boomer managed to transmit what I had mapped when we were arriving to this rock. I hope so. I hope someone is looking for me. I try the comm once every night when the sky is clearest. All I hear is static. I listen for two minutes and then turn it off. There’s no telling how long I’ll be here and I only have one back up battery. I guess I could finagle it a bit to see if I could extend its life, but for how long?</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 18</span><br/>
<em>I think I’m safe where I am. I didn’t hear the popping last night. Maybe it’s looking elsewhere. Or maybe it’s observing me as much as I am trying to observe it and its home. I decided to study my maps—making sure I’m not walking in circles and drawing in what I recall of my travels. If anything, my mission gives me purpose and keeps me sane. It is my duty to the Empire to report what I find, and if I cannot deliver it myself, then I hope that whoever finds these reports will finish what I’ve started.<br/>
<br/>
Please just find us. Find us all.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 19</span><br/>
<em>I found high ground and have a better view of my immediate area. I can see our shuttle in the distance to the south, the tombs of the ancient Sith we were sent here to discover to the west and far to the north I see what might be the ruins of an ancient city. It might take me a few days to get there, but there is a dark forest in my way. I am not Force sensitive (none of us were), but I feel some pull to this place that I cannot understand.<br/>
<br/>
And still no sign of Boomer, Cloke and Morrison.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 22</span><br/>
<em>I woke this morning and saw a figure at the edge of the forest. It looked like, I assume from what I’ve been told, a Force Ghost. At least I haven’t run into any Sithspawns. But it beckoned me towards him (it?). I don’t know how to explain this, so I’m just going to write it. He looked like my grandfather, who was a Sith himself, though to my knowledge he never came to this place. So I followed him and now I’m lost in the forest. The forest, unlike this world, feels so alive—is it the Force? Is the Force most prominent here? I want to say that it feels like an older knowledge of the Force.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 24</span><br/>
<em>I can’t even move. I’m completely drained. I hear the that popping, flashing light. It seems to me that it can’t enter the forest. My grandfather is still around. I think he’s protecting me, or maybe I’m dead. I don’t know. I’m scared. I’m cold. I still have not found my team and I’m beginning to wonder if I will ever leave this place.</em><br/>
<br/>
<span class="u">Day 26</span><br/>
<em>He’s still with me. I feel delirious. He says they’re coming. I don’t even know who. I feel like time has stopped. I’m weak. I try to calculate, but</em><br/>
<br/>
tell my dad I tried my best.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This was written for a writing prompt challenge provided by my guild in SWTOR. This won first place (13million in-game credits!).</p>
<p>The Prompt:<br/>You volunteer to follow a Reclamations expedition to a planet recently found to have had a Sith population several thousand years ago. You wake up one morning, finding the team gone. You look around, and to your astonishment, you see a Force spirit in the treeline. More surprising still, s/he looks familiar in some way...</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>